Word: grained
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...success of the 1980 harvest is especially pleasant because the year began so poorly when the grain embargo temporarily disrupted commodity markets and drove prices down. The Federal Government was forced to buy up some 16.5 million metric tons of grain to stabilize prices...
...summer, however, the farmers' plight had vastly improved. The drought in the U.S., plus bad harvests in Argentina and Australia, gave farm prices a big boost. The cost of grain suddenly shot up by as much as 50%; at that point, buyers snapped up all of the grain in sight and the result was a bonanza for farmers who had been able to ride out the early months of the embargo. "For the first time in 35 years, I'm out of debt," said Clarence Adams of McHenry, Ill. He had sold 30,000 bu. of corn...
...recent weeks, though, farmers have become concerned. Commodity markets have again fallen. The main reason: high interest rates are forcing speculators to sell. Early last month, futures prices on the Chicago Board of Trade nosedived. Says Maurice Van Nostrand of AGRI Industries, a giant Iowa grain coop: "There has never been anything like it in the history of trading...
Farmers face three major hurdles this year: sharply higher prices for farm machinery, stiff anticipated hikes in the price of diesel fuel, and, of course, the weather. The grain belt's perennial Cassandras are already predicting terrible weather for the spring and summer. This time, though, they have real reason for worry. Last summer's drought left the subsoil in the lower wheat-growing states of Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas seriously dehydrated. Another dry summer would cut yields in these areas significantly, and the outlook for rain is not good. Says Iowa's agricultural climatologist Paul Waite...
Although the U.S. grain embargo is yet to have a major impact on Soviet consumers, American farm experts say that the U.S. action may still have an effect on long-term Soviet plans for increasing meat production. For the second year in a row, the Soviets in 1980 had a mediocre crop. Moreover, while the government has so far been able to buy sufficient grain for bread, it is having increasing difficulty finding enough for animal feed. Says one Midwestern grain-industry analyst: "That situation is more difficult [for them] than during the first nine months of the embargo...